Creator

Publisher

Date

2014

Language

Português
Resumo em inglês

Type

Artigo cientifico

Abstract

AbstractThe quest for an evolutionary perspective of human history dates back to Charles Darwin. This chapter reviews the history of eugenics and sociobiology, starting from Darwin, and analysis the (apparent?) reluctance of evolutionary biologists in engaging on the debate over the evolutionary legacy of behavioral and cognition traits in our species. We show that the greatest conflicts over the proposal of a genetic basis for cognition and behavior did revolved over ideological rather than scientific issues. We defend that evolutionary biology can, and should, contribute to correct some aspects of the most recent proposal on this subject, evolutionary psychology. Our species enjoys a level of cognition and of cooperation like no other on the planet. We suggest that efforts should be joined with the social sciences and the neurosciences to explain how this came about.